AUSTIN, Texas — In this week's edition of Texas This Week, Scott Braddock, editor of Harvey Kronberg's Quorum Report, joins Ashley Goudeau to talk about the campaign season.
Three things to know in Texas politics
1. Gov. Greg Abbott: Unconstitutional to raise age to buy assault rifles
While talking with reporters at a campaign event on Wednesday, Gov. Greg Abbott said it would be unconstitutional to raise the age to buy an assault rifle from 18 to 21. Parents and community leaders in Uvalde, where an 18-year-old gunman killed 19 students and two teachers at Robb Elementary School with an AR-15 that he purchased legally, are asking the governor to call a special session to raise the age. The governor pointed to three court rulings, including one issued last month striking down the Texas law that prohibits adults under the age of 21 from carrying handguns.
Brett Cross, whose son was one of the 19 children killed in the Uvalde school shooting, responded with a video on Twitter saying Uvalde parents don't matter to the governor. Meanwhile, the spokesperson for Abbott's Democratic challenger, Beto O'Rourke, released a statement saying O'Rourke will work to raise the age if elected governor.
2. Uvalde County awarded grant to help at-risk youth
Uvalde County's Juvenile Probation Department is getting a nearly $300,000 grant from the State to provide services for at-risk youth. The funding will help children who show emotional or behavioral problems at school that need help beyond school-based interventions. According to the Governor's Office, this will help fill service gaps in mental health care in Uvalde County.
3. Texas buses migrants to Chicago
Operation Lone Star, Gov. Abbott's border initiative, is adding Chicago as a destination for migrants. In April, the state started busing migrants who unlawfully crossed the Texas-Mexico border to Washington, D.C., after they were processed by ICE, then added New York City and now Chicago as destinations. The rides are voluntary. According to Gov. Abbott, more than 7,600 people have been bused to D.C., more than 1,900 to NYC and about 100 to Chicago.
Scott Braddock, editor of Harvey Kronberg's Quorum Report, on campaign season
Campaign season typically kicks off on Labor Day, but this election cycle things are already in full swing. TV ads are airing, people are knocking on doors and candidates are going on tour. Scott Braddock, editor of Harvey Kronberg's Quorum Report, weighs in on what we can expect as we race to Nov. 8.
Ashley Goudeau: Traditionally, Labor Day is the kickoff for political campaigns, but with such a contentious election, we're seeing campaigns already seemingly in full gear right now. But I want you to tell us what we can expect in terms of campaigning as we inch closer to November.
Scott Braddock: "You know, I think things are going to get a lot hotter politically as we go toward November, as the weather hopefully starts to cool off. You already have attacks that are being slung, you know, in different campaigns, especially between Beto O'Rourke, the Democrat running for governor, and the incumbent, Greg Abbott. But I think that that's going to continue to get more intense, if you will. You already see television ads running for both of them before Labor Day, which is highly unusual. I'm trying to think of any time that that's happened before in Texas, that in major markets, people were already seeing television advertising for the folks who are running for governor. It has not happened, you know, in recent memory. And so, you have well-funded campaigns, energetic campaigns. The big question, of course, is going to be whether it's truly competitive, whether this is a year where Republicans dominate, as they usually do in Texas, or whether the Democrats are going to come out pretty strong."
Ashley Goudeau: Yeah, will be interesting to see. One politician who we don't typically see, though, on the campaign trail is Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. But right now he is on a bus tour. His campaign says he will be making 131 stops. First, talk to us about the significance of Patrick even going out on such a tour.
Scott Braddock: "You might remember four years ago when he was running for reelection, the lieutenant governor did something that was a scaled-down version of this. He actually took a private jet around the country, around the state, stopping in different cities and talking to reporters in those cities. This time around, a little different. He's got a double-decker bus. It almost looks like the inside of it looked like a stretch limo in Las Vegas or something. He's living in there, you know, I guess for the next month or so, 131 cities is going to take a while to get to those places. I think a couple of things about it. Number one, when you have a bus tour in a smaller state like, say, New Hampshire or Iowa, where folks run for president, of course, in these primaries, a bus tour, there is more of an actual attempt at campaigning. A bus tour in Texas is an attempt to look like you are campaigning, because if you think about how long the person is actually on the bus versus how long they're actually out at campaign events. Most of the time, they're actually inside the bus. George P. Bush, when he was running for reelection as land commissioner years ago, did the same thing. And the joke among some political consultants was that it was really a way for him to sort of insulate himself from actually having to be out and about with real people. Think about how long it takes to get from San Antonio to Austin or Austin to DFW, DFW out to Abilene and Amarillo and places like that. Some of those trips are two hours, three hours, six hours. So, in some cases, the lieutenant governor is going to spend the entire day on the bus only to then, you know, get to an event and talk to, you know, several people in whatever city here he arrives at. The other thing about it is that it does at least seem to be an attempt to show folks in rural Texas that he's not taking them for granted. I remember back in 2014, after Patrick defeated former Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst in the Republican primary, Patrick's consultant, Alan Blakemore, was bragging about the fact that Patrick did really well in the cities and in the suburbs, and that David Dewhurst, in his words, 'Did well out where the cows and chickens are out in the country.' He said, you know where the people are, that's where Patrick did well and where there aren't as many people, that's where Dewhurst did well. But then if you fast forward to 2018, one of the lessons that Republican candidates learned that year when Beto O'Rourke performed so well against Ted Cruz is they cannot take rural voters for granted. At the end of that 2018 campaign, you saw Cruz rushing to go campaign in places like Amarillo, Lubbock, Texarkana, etc., because he was trying to pump up the vote in those rural areas. The rural areas really are the firewall for Republicans in this state as Democrats continue to surge not just in the big cities, but in the suburbs as well."
Ashley Goudeau: One of the things that Patrick has gotten some criticism, if you will, about this this bus tour is that there's not a lot of information. You pointed out that before he went out, he talked with reporters, did things of that nature in previous years. Reporters don't even have a schedule for this bus tour. Talk to me about some of that.
Scott Braddock: "You know, more and more, our statewide Republican officeholders are avoiding not just average voters, but also the press. I mean, one thing that I noticed and picked up on in the last couple of weeks is that both Lt. Gov. Patrick and Gov. Abbott have even been avoiding local conservative media. You know, these are folks who usually would appear on conservative radio talk shows around the state, and they haven't been doing that probably for about the last six months. It seems like they're not really interested in answering real questions. It's more of a photo op opportunity. And as my colleague Jeremy Wallace over at the Houston Chronicle had pointed out the other day, he said it's interesting that the press release about one of the events for Patrick's tour, the press release came out after that event had already happened, and it just offered some pictures of the event. There was nothing you could really do at that point other than maybe point to the pictures. But, you know, reporters are not even able to show up and talk to the lieutenant governor about why he thinks that he ought to win and make that case to voters and traditional media. He's trying to sidestep that and just do all of this through a PR campaign."
Ashley Goudeau: Now, you did make a comment about going on a bus tour and how that is sort of laughable, if you will, for folks in a state as big as Texas. So then I have to ask you, what do you make of Beto O'Rourke driving across Texas?
Scott Braddock: "It's a little different, isn't it? Beto has the ability to, you know, and whether this is going to win the campaign for him, who knows, that's a question mark, but he has the ability to put together these large rallies, and those don't just happen on their own. You see a lot of people at rallies for Beto O'Rourke, whether it's in big places like Houston or small places like Lubbock. And it's kind of a fascinating thing, although if people are getting too excited about that, Ashley, remember, he was able to attract the same kind of crowds in 2018 when he still lost the race. Now for Lt. Gov. Patrick, those pictures that you see coming from his campaign of some of these events, they show him with 10s of people I would say. I've saw him with five people here, 10 people there. You know, a dozen people here or there. And look, those rallies, they don't necessarily win you the campaign, but it's Dan Patrick and other Republicans who pointed to the successful rallies, giant crowds that were attracted by former President Trump. Trump, of course, has endorsed Gov. Abbott and Lt. Gov. Patrick as well. So on the one hand, it's hard for them to praise Trump for getting these large crowds, big rallies. But then, on the other hand, it's hard for them to dismiss the same kind of crowds that are being attracted by Beto O'Rourke, at least as far as the size of those crowds is concerned."
Ashley Goudeau: Yeah. You know, in terms of the Democratic candidate running for lieutenant governor, Mike Collier, what are you seeing, is there anything that you're seeing of note from coming from his campaign?
Scott Braddock: "He's been pretty aggressive, probably the most aggressive of any lieutenant governor campaign for a Democrat in Texas in many years. You've seen the television ads where he is saying that Patrick needs to, quote, 'Fix the damn grid.' That's all over his campaign materials, you know, his bumper stickers and T-shirts and things like that. He's also, unlike Patrick, appearing in local conservative media. I saw just the other day a radio appearance by Mike Collier in Lubbock on a very conservative radio station. He's willing to go talk to voters who might not necessarily agree with him about everything. And I don't see Dan Patrick doing that."
Ashley Goudeau: Fascinating to see that, how different they're running those campaigns. But at the end of the day, the poll numbers still showing favorable numbers towards Lt. Gov. Patrick.
Scott Braddock: "Absolutely. If this was a baseball game, I would say that we're probably in the top of the fourth, Republicans are up by about three runs, there's a lot of baseball left to play."
You can learn more about the election here.
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